Swedish police will adopt drones as an essential part of law enforcement’s everyday toolkit.

Ekaterina Blinova — Swedish police have purchased several drones in order to test them as a part of law enforcement’s toolkit.

According to Swedish media sources, the unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) will be tested across the country and adopted for official police duties by summer 2015. Per Engstrom, a team leader of the Swedish National Police Board in Stockholm characterized the aerial vehicles as small but reliable, adding that they differ from those commonly used by drone enthusiasts.

The RCMP has warned the federal government that drones — unmanned aerial vehicles — pose a terrorism threat to critical infrastructure in Canada.

Yet a year later, and more than 4½ years after a regulatory overhaul began, Transport Canada has still not developed tougher rules around unmanned flight.

In Paris, mystery drone flights near iconic landmarks like the Eiffel Tower, Les Invalides museum, the U.S. Embassy and government buildings — just weeks after terror attacks on the satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine — left the French capital rattled.

Police arrested three Al Jazeera journalists who said they were just filming a news report on the strange unmanned flights. The operator or operators of several suspicious drones spotted in Parisian skies remains unidentified.

In Washington, an intoxicated federal employee crash landed a drone on the White House lawn, exposing a security gap that also faces law enforcement here: many small unmanned aircraft models cannot be detected, let alone shot down by security forces.

Last year the RCMP flagged that very problem. A threat assessment dated March 5, 2014, warned that critical Canadian facilities are targets at risk, and it noted drones have been flown dangerously close to political figures in Europe.

Much of the document is redacted, but it notes that drones have already been used to deliver drugs into a Canadian prison, and it may be only a matter of time before they’re used for more devastating ends.

The document says extremists have “demonstrated they are ready to use UAVs enabled with GPS (global positioning systems) to carry out aerial surveillance in real time of targets and to transport improvised explosive devices and chemical or biological agents.”

A landmark project that tests unmanned aircraft for the federal government plans to expand its flights of so-called “drones” from its busiest launch site — Port Mansfield.

Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi announced its Lone Star Unmanned Aircraft Systems Center will start launching monthly flights in May from Charles R. Johnson Airport here, where it has tested unmanned aircraft, or drones, since October, said Ron George, the university’s senior research development officer.

The program plans to launch its next test flights here Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, the university said. Read the full article…